Good morning to you, too. What can I do you for (or is it do for you)?
Whichever, sir. Actually, I’m here to seek your help to uncover certain but very essential details about “the talk of the town man”, Nnamdi Kanu, who has held us and the entire world spellbound with his sensational and comical trial.
What exactly do you want me to do?
We need a blow-by-blow account of who this “flamboyant accused” is, many of the listeners and watchers of the one in town trial want to know who the hell is this stormy petrel of wild agitation for self-determination in the court of law.
No problem. His countryman is here who is in a very good position to run down the tape for you. Hold on a second and em..emm…Emeka! Emeka! Bring the Blue File with immediate immediately. Oga reporter, make you no laugh me o.
Sir, this is it.
Thanks. That’s fast, isn’t it? You can now go…. Now, this is it. Your subject of interest is a rabble rouser who doesn’t really know the implications of what he is doing. A man who doesn’t know which one is his left or right hand.
Why did you say that?
He is too young to know what war means.
As old as he is? I think he should know.
Not like that. I mean if he had had the experience of war in real time, he would not be treading the path of war, cos if what is in the fille is to be followed to the letters this guy was virtually not in existence during the war to know how it feels.
What is that mean?
That braggart was barely two months old when the civil war started.
Really? You mean this hefty man with white “bear’ bear’ “ na “yesterday child”?
Yes, the war started July 6. 1967 while he was born September 25, same year. You see, he was neither a “puer beli” (boy of war) nor an “ajantal” (enfant terrible). Just emerged from the blues chanting war songs.
How did it happen? Is it possible he just woke up one night and started dancing war dance?
Who knows? One school of thought thinks he got the vibes for militancy right from the womb (Ojukwu declared secession and birth of Biafra on May 30, 1967) …
You mean Nnamdi was still in his mama’s womb when the Nigeria- Biafra War started?
Sebi, I told you before. You don forget so soon?
No, I’m just wondering nah.
The Second School of Thought says he must have developed his own brand of stubbornness right from Government College, Umuahia, where he had his secondary school education and later gained admission to University of Nigeria, Nsukka for his university education which, unfortunately, he did not complete before moving to the United Kingdom. His activism drew him closer to Ralph Uwazurike, leader of the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra, MASSOB. The synergy between the two seemed to be going so well that Ralph handed the still active propaganda Radio Biafra to him to anchor. Nnamdi Kanu instantly became another Okonko Ndem of what was “the rebel radio”to Nigerian authorities but Radio Biafra to the rest of the world in those days.
How did Kanu’s own organisation, the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, come about?
It was a case of “if the rat cannot move fast enough, he should make way for the tortoise” but in this case it is the proverb in reverse order. The more militant Kanu wanted to establish a physical presence in Igbo heartland from which to spread the gospel of SELF DETERMINATION.
How did he intend to pull that off?
He set up a militant group he named the east security network, ESN, with which he allegedly terrorized both indigenes and “aliens” alike.
And he was doing that for how long?
For as long as he was outside the country. Remember he was virtually the sole director and anchor of Radio Biafra abroad after Ralph had publicly (allegedly) surrendered the radio to him, akin to washing his hands off the unbridled, ultra lens militancy that seems to see beyond BIAFRA OF THE MIND legacy Ojukwu handed to his people on the eve of his final departure from his earthly kingdom.
Did Kanu come to Nigeria voluntarily to have his day in court?
For where? It took InterPol, International Police ORGANISATION to “semi-Dikko” him back to the country from Kenya to come and face charges of “criminal conspiracy, intimidation and terrorism”. The rest is history, as they say.
Thanks for this illuminating tale of the tape. Nnamdi Kanu’s magazine A-Z, as it were.
Hmmm…Akiika! Okidokido!
Quote: If he had had the experience of war in real time, he would not be treading the path of war….
Dele Omotunde
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